'Hollo!' cried Lake. He was standing with his back to the window, and sprang forward, as pale as she, and grasped her, with a white leer that she never forgot, over his shoulder, and the Venice glass was shivered on the ground. 'Who's there?' he whispered. And Rachel, in a whisper, ejaculated the awful name that must not be taken in vain. She sat down. She was looking at him with a wild, stern stare, straight in the face, and he still holding her arm, and close to her. 'I see it all now,' she whispered. 'Who--what--what is it?' said he. 'I could not have fancied _that_,' she whispered with a gasp. Stanley looked round him with pale and sharpened features. 'What the devil is it! If that scoundrel had come to kill us you could not cry out louder,' he whispered, with an oath. 'Do you want to wake your people up?' 'Oh! Stanley,' she repeated, in a changed and horror-stricken way. 'What a fool I've been. I see it at last; I see it all now,' and she waved her white hands together very slowly towards him, as mesmerisers move theirs. There was a silence of some seconds, and his yellow ferine gaze met hers strangely. 'You were always a sharp girl, Radie, and I think you do see it,' he said at last, very quietly. 'The witness--the witness--the dreadful witness!' she repeated. 'I'll show you, though, it's not so bad as you fancy. I'm sorry I did not take your advice; but how, I say, could I know he was such a devil? I must go back to him. I only came down to tell you, because Radie, you know you proposed it yourself; _you_ must come, too--you _must_, Radie.' 'Oh, Stanley, Stanley, Stanley!' 'Why, d-- it, it can't be helped now; can it?' said he, with a peevish malignity. But she was right; there was something of the poltroon in him, and he was trembling. 'Why could you not leave me in peace, Stanley?' 'I can't go without you, Rachel. I won't; and if we don't we're both ruined,' he said, with a bleak oath. 'Yes, Stanley, I knew you were a coward,' she replied, fiercely and wildly. 'You're always calling names, d-- you; do as you like. I care less than you think how it goes.' 'No, Stanley; you know me too well. Ah! No, you sha'n't be lost if I can help it.' Rachel shook her head as she spoke, with a bitter smile and a dreadful sigh. Then they whispered together for three or four minutes, and Rachel clasped her jewelled fingers tight across her forehead, quite wildly, for a minute. 'You'll come then?' said Stanley. She made no answer, and he repeated the question. By this time she was standing; and without answering, she began mechanically to get on her cloak and hat. 'You must drink some wine first; he may frighten you, perhaps. You _must_ take it, Rachel, or I'll not go.' Stanley Lake was swearing, in his low tones, like a swell-mobsman to-night. Rachel seemed to have made up her mind to submit passively to whatever he required. Perhaps, indeed, she thought there was wisdom in his advice. At all events she drank some wine.